How This Lake in Northwest Asia Got Deadlier Than Chernobyl

Summary

In 1957 Central Russia, the Kyshtym Disaster occurred near the secret Mayak nuclear facility, causing widespread radiation sickness and contamination. The Soviet Union's aggressive pursuit of nuclear power post-WWII led to the creation of secret cities like Chelyabinsk 40 and environmental catastrophes, including the radioactive Lake Karachay. The disaster was concealed from the public for decades, revealing the dangers of nuclear energy misuse and the importance of scientific understanding in preventing such tragedies.

Takeaways

• 😨 The 1957 Kyshtym Disaster in the Southern Ural Mountains was one of the worst nuclear accidents in history, categorized as a Level Six Serious Accident on the International Nuclear Events Scale.
• 🏭 The Mayak nuclear facility, established as a response to the US nuclear capabilities demonstrated in WWII, was a secret location for the development and weaponization of plutonium.
• 🔒 The Soviet Union created the secret city of Chelyabinsk 40 (City 40) to house nuclear scientists, workers, and their families, with strict isolation from the outside world.
• 🌐 The concept of closed cities and much of the nuclear research knowledge was derived from the US, including from Soviet spy rings within the Manhattan Project.
• 🚫 Safety and environmental concerns were severely neglected at Mayak, leading to the handling of plutonium without proper protection and the contamination of local water sources.
• 💥 The Kyshtym Disaster was the result of an explosion at a storage tank containing 80 tons of liquid radioactive waste, releasing a radioactive cloud over a wide area.
• 🏠 The disaster led to the forced evacuation, destruction of homes, and incineration of entire villages, with the affected population being misled about the true nature of the threat.
• 🌍 The Soviet Union's secrecy surrounding the Mayak facility meant that the Kyshtym Disaster was hidden from the world for decades, unlike more well-known accidents like Chernobyl and Fukushima.
• 🌿 Lake Karachay became known as one of the most polluted places on Earth due to the dumping of radioactive waste, with radiation levels significantly higher than Chernobyl's in certain isotopes.
• 🌟 The story of the Kyshtym Disaster and Lake Karachay highlights the importance of understanding nuclear physics and safety, which can be learned through platforms like Brilliant.

Q & A

What was the significance of the events in Hiroshima and Nagasaki in 1945 to the Soviet Union's nuclear program?

The detonation of nuclear weapons by the United States in Hiroshima and Nagasaki during World War II alarmed the Soviet Union. This led Joseph Stalin to decide that the Soviet's existing nuclear program was insufficient and needed to be aggressively pursued to avoid falling behind the US in nuclear capabilities.

Why was the location near the Southern Ural Mountains chosen for the Mayak plutonium plant?

The remote area near the Southern Ural Mountains was selected for the Mayak plutonium plant due to its secrecy, being far from major population centers and difficult to detect by foreign intelligence. It was about 1,800 kilometers from Moscow and served as an ideal hidden location for the Soviet Union's nuclear activities.

What was the role of the secret city of Chelyabinsk 40 in relation to the Mayak nuclear facility?

Chelyabinsk 40, also known as City 40, was established as a secret city to house the nuclear scientists, workers, and their families who were involved with the Mayak nuclear facility. It was a closed city with strict security measures, ensuring that the residents could not communicate with the outside world and maintaining the secrecy of the nuclear program.

How did the Soviet Union's lack of knowledge in nuclear physics contribute to safety issues at Mayak?

The Soviet Union's gaps in nuclear physics knowledge, partly due to the reliance on stolen research and espionage, led to serious safety issues at Mayak. Workers were not properly protected, environmental concerns were neglected, and there was a lack of understanding of the dangers of handling radioactive materials, leading to improper handling and storage of nuclear waste.

What was the open-cycle cooling system at Mayak and why was it problematic?

The open-cycle cooling system at Mayak used water from Lake Kyzyltash and the Techa River to cool the nuclear reactors. The problem was that the contaminated water was discharged back into the same water bodies without proper treatment, leading to widespread environmental contamination and posing health risks to the local population.

What was the Kyshtym Disaster and how did it compare to other nuclear accidents?

The Kyshtym Disaster, also known as the Chelyabinsk Disaster, occurred on September 29, 1957, when a storage tank containing 80 tons of liquid radioactive waste exploded at the Mayak plant. It was one of the worst nuclear accidents in history and was categorized as a Level Six Serious Accident on the International Nuclear Events Scale. It was four times worse than Chernobyl in terms of acute radiation sickness cases.

Why was the evacuation and information disclosure regarding the Kyshtym Disaster delayed?

The evacuation and information disclosure were delayed due to the secrecy surrounding the Mayak facility. The Soviet Union wanted to avoid international condemnation and maintain the facade that such a disaster did not occur. As a result, the affected communities were not immediately informed of the radiological nature of the accident and were only told about a mysterious disease outbreak.

What was the long-term impact of the radioactive contamination on the people and environment around Lake Karachay?

The radioactive contamination from Lake Karachay had severe long-term impacts, including widespread sickness and death among the exposed population, barren and unusable land for potentially centuries, and a significantly reduced life expectancy in the area. The environment suffered from the contamination of water sources and the creation of no-go zones around the radioactive lakes.

How did the secrecy of the Mayak facility and the Kyshtym Disaster affect the global awareness of nuclear accidents?

The secrecy surrounding the Mayak facility and the Kyshtym Disaster meant that the incident was not widely known or acknowledged until decades later. This lack of transparency contributed to a more limited global awareness of the disaster compared to other nuclear accidents like Chernobyl and Fukushima, which were more openly discussed and reported.

What measures were taken to mitigate the risks posed by Lake Karachay after the disasters?

After the disasters, the Soviet government took measures to mitigate the risks from Lake Karachay by covering the lake with 10,000 concrete blocks to prevent the shifting of toxic sediments and burying the remaining water under cement. This was done to reduce the spread of radioactive materials and protect the population from further irradiation.

Outlines

00:00

😱 The Mystery of Central Russia's Forced Evacuation

In 1957, villagers near the Southern Ural Mountains in Central Russia experienced a terrifying event where they were forced to leave their homes by government officials without any clear explanation. The villagers witnessed their crops being buried and their livestock slaughtered. They were told there was an outbreak of a special disease, but the true cause was kept secret. Homes were set on fire, and everything was incinerated. This event was connected to the Soviet Union's secret nuclear program, which began after the United States' nuclear attacks on Hiroshima and Nagasaki during World War II. The Soviet Union, under Joseph Stalin, decided to aggressively pursue nuclear weapons and chose a remote area near the Ural Mountains to build their first plutonium plant, named Mayak.

05:04

🚧 The Secret City and Nuclear Disasters

To support the Mayak plant, the Soviet Union created a secret city called Chelyabinsk 40, where nuclear scientists, workers, and their families lived in isolation, cut off from the outside world. The city was surrounded by barbed wire fences and guarded gates, with its inhabitants' identities erased from Soviet records. The nuclear facility's operations led to severe environmental contamination, with radioactive waste being dumped into nearby water bodies, including Lake Kyzyltash and the Techa River, which were used by locals for drinking water and recreation. The dumping of radioactive materials led to the creation of highly toxic lakes, including Lake Karachay, which became a significant source of radioactivity. The Kyshtym Disaster in 1957, a nuclear accident at the Mayak plant, caused widespread contamination and was one of the worst nuclear accidents in history, yet it remained a secret due to the facility's covert nature.

10:06

☢️ The Legacy of Lake Karachay and the Impact on Ozersk

Lake Karachay accumulated immense radioactivity, becoming one of the most polluted places on Earth. Despite the drying up of the lake in the 1960s, a drought in 1967 exposed the toxic sediment, leading to another disaster when radioactive dust was scattered by a windstorm. The Soviet government eventually took measures to contain the lake by covering it with concrete blocks. The secrecy surrounding the Mayak facility and the Kyshtym Disaster was maintained until the late 1980s when documents were declassified. After the Soviet collapse, the Russian government recognized the formerly secret cities, and Chelyabinsk 40 was renamed Ozersk. Despite its picturesque appearance, Ozersk faces ongoing issues with contaminated food and water, leading to health problems among its residents. The average life expectancy in Ozersk is significantly lower than in other regions, highlighting the lasting impact of the nuclear disasters.

Keywords

💡Brilliant

Brilliant is described as a problem-solving website that teaches users to think like scientists. It offers interactive quizzes and courses designed to be engaging and informative. In the context of the video, Brilliant is positioned as a resource that could have helped the scientists at Mayak to better understand nuclear physics and potentially avoid the Kyshtym Disaster, highlighting the importance of education in scientific fields.

💡Kyshtym Disaster

The Kyshtym Disaster refers to one of the worst nuclear accidents in history, which occurred on September 29th, 1957, at the Mayak nuclear facility. A storage tank containing 80 tons of liquid radioactive waste exploded, releasing a significant amount of radioactive material into the environment. This disaster is a central theme of the video, illustrating the consequences of inadequate scientific knowledge and safety measures in nuclear facilities.

💡Mayak

Mayak was the first-ever plutonium plant built by the Soviet Union near the southern Ural Mountains. It was constructed in secrecy and involved the forced labor of gulag inmates. The facility's operations led to significant environmental contamination and the Kyshtym Disaster. The term 'Mayak' in the video represents the hub of the Soviet Union's early nuclear efforts and the associated risks and failures.

💡City 40

City 40, also known as Chelyabinsk 40, was a secret city established by the Soviet Union to house the workers and scientists of the Mayak nuclear facility. It was a closed city, cut off from the outside world, and its existence was hidden from the public. In the video, City 40 symbolizes the extreme secrecy and isolation that characterized the Soviet Union's nuclear program during the Cold War era.

💡Radioactive Waste

Radioactive waste refers to the byproducts of nuclear reactions that remain radioactive and can be hazardous to human health and the environment. In the video, the mishandling of radioactive waste at Mayak, including its disposal in nearby water bodies, is highlighted as a significant factor contributing to the environmental disaster and the health risks faced by the local population.

💡Lake Karachay

Lake Karachay is depicted as a lake that became extremely polluted due to the dumping of radioactive waste from the Mayak facility. It accumulated a significant amount of radioactivity, making it one of the most polluted places on Earth. The lake is used in the video to emphasize the long-term environmental impact of nuclear accidents and the challenges of remediation.

💡Nuclear Physics

Nuclear physics is the field of physics that studies the structure and behavior of atomic nuclei and the subatomic particles that constitute them. In the video, a lack of understanding of nuclear physics is presented as a contributing factor to the safety issues and accidents at Mayak, underscoring the importance of scientific knowledge in the safe handling of nuclear materials.

💡Chain Reaction

A chain reaction in the context of nuclear physics refers to a self-sustaining series of nuclear reactions, such as those that can occur in a nuclear reactor or a nuclear explosion. The video mentions the importance of understanding chain reactions for generating electricity and avoiding uncontrolled explosions, which is relevant to the operations of nuclear facilities like Mayak.

💡International Nuclear Events Scale

The International Nuclear Events Scale (INES) is a tool used to categorize the severity of nuclear incidents. The Kyshtym Disaster is categorized as a Level Six Serious Accident on this scale, indicating a major release of radioactive material with widespread effects. The video uses the INES to compare the severity of the Kyshtym Disaster with other well-known nuclear accidents.

💡Secret City

A secret city, as mentioned in the video, refers to a city that is hidden from public knowledge and often constructed around secret military or scientific installations. City 40 is an example of a secret city, and the concept is used in the video to discuss the secrecy and isolation that were characteristic of the Soviet Union's nuclear program during the Cold War.

💡Radioactive Dust

Radioactive dust refers to particulate matter contaminated with radioactive materials, which can be spread by wind and pose a significant inhalation risk. In the video, the drying of Lake Karachay's bed due to drought led to the formation of radioactive dust, which was then spread by a windstorm, causing further irradiation of the population. This concept is used to illustrate the unforeseen and far-reaching consequences of nuclear contamination.

Highlights

The video discusses the historical context of the Soviet Union's nuclear program, triggered by the US nuclear attacks on Hiroshima and Nagasaki.

The Soviet Union's secret nuclear facility, Mayak, was constructed near the southern Ural Mountains using forced labor from gulag inmates.

Mayak's first success was the detonation of their first plutonium bomb, named First Lightning, in 1949.

The secret city of Chelyabinsk 40 was established to house nuclear scientists, workers, and their families, with strict isolation from the outside world.

The concept of closed cities around secret nuclear facilities was inspired by the US's Hanford nuclear plant and the secret city of Richland.

Soviet nuclear research was significantly influenced by spy rings within the Manhattan Project, leading to gaps in knowledge about nuclear safety.

The open-cycle cooling system at Mayak led to the contamination of Lake Kyzyltash and the Techa River, impacting local residents and the environment.

Mayak's storage problem resulted in the dumping of radioactive waste into nearby water bodies, creating toxic reservoirs.

Lake Karachay became one of the most polluted places on Earth due to the dumping of highly-contaminated radioactive waste.

The Kyshtym Disaster in 1957 was a significant nuclear accident caused by the explosion of a storage tank containing radioactive waste.

The Soviet Union's secrecy surrounding the Mayak facility led to delayed evacuation and misinformation about the nature of the Kyshtym Disaster.

The Kyshtym Disaster resulted in widespread contamination and was eventually categorized as a Level Six Serious Accident on the International Nuclear Events Scale.

Lake Karachay's radioactivity was so high that standing by its shores for an hour could be lethal.

The Soviet government's response to the disasters included covering Lake Karachay with concrete blocks to contain the radioactive sediment.

The CIA was aware of the Mayak facility and its incidents as early as 1957 but chose to keep it secret to avoid public concern near US nuclear facilities.

After the Soviet collapse, the Russian government recognized the previously secret cities, including City 40, now renamed Ozersk.

Despite its picturesque appearance, Ozersk faces ongoing issues with contaminated food, water, and a lower life expectancy rate among its residents.

The video concludes with a call to action for viewers to learn about nuclear physics and safety through the educational platform Brilliant, which was not available during the era of the Mayak facility.

Transcripts

- [Kento] I'm Kento Bento.

- [Narrator] This video is made possible by Brilliant, a problem-solving website

that teaches you to think like a scientist.

Central Russia, 1957.

Villagers near the Southern Ural mountains were scared,

they were terrified.

Men claiming to be from the government had appeared out of nowhere,

ordering people to leave their homes.

Without warning, they started burying crops, and slaughtering livestock - their livestock.

The villagers were in shock, they were confused.

What was going on?

They were being forced away, but they soon realized it wasn't just their village,

it was everyone's village.

And some people looked ill.

The only information given was that there had been an outbreak of a special disease,

and everyone needed to leave.

But the source of this disease was a mystery.

Was it the river? The lake?

Was it the strange lights people saw in the sky not long ago?

Nothing was revealed. They felt helpless.

Looking back at their village, they were horrified at what they saw.

Their homes were now on fire. Everything was being incinerated.

This happened in 1957, but what lead to this moment actually started 12 years earlier.

Hiroshima, August 6th, 1945, 6000 kilometers away.

The United States detonates a nuclear weapon during the final stage of World War II.

Many people died, mostly civilians.

Three days later in Nagasaki, it happened again.

These events remain the only use of nuclear weapons in the history of warfare.

The world became acquainted with the nuclear might of America.

Now this did not sit well with The Soviet Union.

After learning about Japan, Joseph Stalin decided that their existing nuclear program was insufficient

and needed to be aggressively pursued.

Falling behind the US in the development of nuclear weapons, was not an option.

But they first needed a location, a secret location, hidden from the rest of the world.

They selected a remote area near the southern Ural Mountains, in Central Russia,

about 1,800 kilometers from Moscow.

For locational reference,

the Ural mountains is widely considered the northern border between Asia and Europe.

This is where they decided to build their first-ever plutonium plant, named Mayak.

From 1945 to 1948, 70,000 gulag inmates from 12 labor camps were forced into constructing this nuclear facility.

Seven military reactors would eventually line the southern shore of Lake Kyzyltash,

note though the lake referenced in the title, is not this lake.

Pre-Cold War tensions were mounting so all this was done in a great hurry and in total secrecy.

After construction, the plant immediately began processing and weaponizing plutonium,

with their greatest success coming in the form of their first plutonium bomb, named First Lightning,

which was detonated in 1949.

But now, along with this secret facility, there was a need for a secret city,

where all the nuclear scientists, workers, and their families could live.

And so the secret city of Chelyabinsk 40 was born, Chelyabinsk being the name of the nearest big city,

and 40, the last digits of the postal code.

This place was also colloquially known as City 40.

Reinforced by barbed wire fences and guarded gates,

no one was allowed to enter or leave this city.

Residents were forbidden to send letters or to make contact with the outside world.

For decades, this closed city of 100,000 people did not appear on any of the Soviet maps,

and the identities of the inhabitants were erased from the official Soviet records.

Those who had been relocated to City 40 by order of the Soviet Party

were considered missing by their relatives back home.

And mercilessly, if anyone refused to work at Mayak, to live in the secret city,

they would be taken to a prison camp and executed.

After all, by that time they would have already been introduced to state secrets.

City 40 is actually one of 44 known closed cities in Russia, probably the most prominent of them all,

but it's important to note that the Soviet Union did not come up with the idea.

The concept of closed cities surrounding secret nuclear facilities was stolen from the United States

when Stalin's spies intercepted plans for the Hanford nuclear plant,

which the secret city of Richland, Washington was built around.

Note the Hanford nuclear plant had manufactured the plutonium

that was used in the atomic bomb over Nagasaki.

It wasn't just the idea of closed cities that was taken from the US,

but much of the nuclear research and knowledge was gained directly from Soviet spy rings working in the Manhattan Project.

As a result there were massive gaps in the Soviet physicists' knowledge about nuclear physics,

which was really, really bad when it came to safety.

Workers were not protected, environmental concerns were not taken seriously,

and, shockingly, people were handling plutonium with their bare hands.

They didn't know any better.

Now, a system was set up.

Water from the nearby Lake Kyzyltash and Techa River was used to cool the nuclear reactors,

to prevent overheating, but there was a problem.

They had implemented an open-cycle cooling system

where the water was circulating directly through the reactor core,

which meant contaminated water was being discharged directly back into the lake and river,

the same lake children played in every summer,

and the same river used as drinking water by the locals.

And we're not just talking about the residents of City 40 here,

but also the numerous villages along the Techa who were dependent on the river as a water source,

40 villages in total, with about 28,000 people.

But it gets worse.

Mayak had a storage problem.

They didn't know what to do with their highly-contaminated radioactive waste.

They tried storing them in underground tanks for a while,

but the upkeep was inconvenient for them,

as the tanks needed to be constantly cooled to prevent self-overheating.

So what did they do?

They straight dumped the radioactive waste in the various bodies of water around Mayak.

This included further contamination of the Techa River,

which, important to note, connects to the river Ob, which flows into the Arctic Ocean,

but, not only that, the surrounding lakes became toxic reservoirs.

We already know about the contamination of Lake Kyzyltash,

but this lake in particular, Lake Irtyash, over time accumulated so much radioactive waste

it became known to the locals as The Plutonium Lake, or The Lake of Death.

Now here's the thing. Neither of these lakes is the lake referenced in the title,

which means there is a lake more deadly than even the Lake of Death.

And it's this one. Lake Karachay.

A baby compared to the others, but packing a punch, a radioactive punch.

Sure many of the surrounding lakes became regular dumping grounds

for highly-contaminated radioactive waste,

but the dumping that took place at Karachay was next level.

The combination of the proximity to Mayak,

the fewer lakeside residents,

and the more diminutive size of the lake,

made this a convenient and seemingly less risky option for open-air storage.

As such, significantly large amounts of solid, liquid and gaseous radioactive material

was continuously released into Karachay, more so than other lakes.

With all this dumping, the people at Mayak ended up neglecting the underground storage tanks from earlier,

which was not cool.

No, literally, because the high level of radioactivity

meant that the waste was heating itself through decay heat,

in other words pressure was building.

Sure they had a cooling system in place, but it was a pretty crappy cooling system,

and it was poorly maintained.

It was just a matter of time until,

well, until this.

September 29th, 1957.

The cooling system for the storage tanks failed.

A tank containing 80 tons of liquid radioactive waste exploded

with an estimated force of up to a 100 tons of TNT.

90% of radioactive material released was deposited within the vicinity of Mayak and City 40,

but the remaining 10% formed a radioactive cloud reaching a height of one kilometer.

The next 10 hours saw it drift northeasterly, causing widespread contamination over hundreds of kilometers.

This was the Kyshtym Disaster, one of the worst nuclear accidents in history.

The event was eventually categorized as a Level Six Serious Accident

on the International Nuclear Events Scale.

Only two incidents in history have been more severe,

Chernobyl and Fukushima, at Level Seven.

However, in terms of the number of cases of acute radiation sickness,

the Kyshtym Disaster was actually four times worse than Chernobyl.

Due to the secrecy surrounding Mayak,

the communities in the nearby affected areas were not immediately informed of the accident.

Shockingly, it wasn't until a week later that the evacuation process started,

and really only for the communities closest to the contamination site.

Understandably, the affected villagers were frightened by the sudden appearance of soldiers.

They were ordered to leave their homes.

Their crops were buried.

Their livestock was slaughtered.

Shock and confusion rang out as they were being forced away.

Some villagers showed visible signs of radiation poisoning,

but since the Mayak facility wasn't supposed to exist,

the soldiers were not allowed to reveal the truth of the situation, that it was radiological in nature.

Instead the villagers were told that there was an outbreak of a special disease,

one that was unknown and mysterious even to them, and they needed to leave.

Some suspected it was related to the strange lights people saw in the sky not long ago,

but they weren't sure.

After that initial evacuation phase, the abandoned homes and infrastructures had to be destroyed,

much to the dismay of residents.

All-in-all, at least 23 villages were incinerated.

Yes, some were evacuated after a week,

but it took up to 11 years for all residents in the wider affected areas to be evacuated.

In total, almost half a million people were exposed to radiation,

there was sickness and death,

and much of the surrounding land was left barren and unusable for, perhaps, centuries,

With Mayak being a secret facility, the Soviet Union had to deny the catastrophe ever happened.

Add to that the fear of international condemnation,

which is why most people today tend to be aware of Chernobyl, and Fukushima,

as some of the worst nuclear accidents in history, even the Three Mile Island Incident,

but not so much The Kyshtym Disaster, despite being comparable, if not worse in many ways.

Right, but back to the lake.

Because Lake Karachay wasn't about to be upstaged by the Kyshtym Disaster.

This lake accumulated 4.4 exabecquerels of radioactivity over time,

which isn't quite to the level of the radioactivity released from Chernobyl,

but if we were to break down the caesium-137 from each,

which is the radioactive isotope that contributes to land contamination, the rest is too short-lived,

Karachay ends up being significantly worse at 3.6 exabecquerels compared to Chernobyl's 0.085.

There's a few ways to interpret this,

but you can say Lake Karachay is arguably the most polluted place on earth.

Really bad, but at least, by the 1960s the lake was drying up, it was disappearing.

The threat seemed to be lessening with each passing year.

In 1967, a drought hit the region lowering Lake Karachay's water-level even further

to the point where much of the lakebed was exposed.

This was seemingly good.

Except that it wasn't,

because the previously-submerged toxic sediment was now exposed to the harsh sunlight.

It was drying out, and forming dust.

Deadly radioactive dust.

And all that was needed was a strong gust of wind, and yet another horrifying disaster.

Well, they didn't get a strong gust of wind.

They got something far worse, a violent windstorm, scattering across the region.

Once again, half a million people were irradiated.

The government finally had enough.

They piled 10,000 concrete blocks on top of the lake;

preventing sediments from shifting and burying the remaining water under cement.

It wasn't until 1989 onwards that the Soviet Government

declassified documents relating to the radiological disasters in the Southern Urals,

and the whole world finally found out about Lake Karachay,

the Mayak nuclear facility, the Techa River,

and the secret city of Chelyabinsk 40, or City 40.

Interestingly, it was later revealed that the CIA actually knew about Mayak, and some of its major incidents,

since 1957, and had decided to keep it a secret

to not cause concern among people living near nuclear facilities, in the US.

Which means, yes, the CIA actually helped the Soviet Union

keep its early nuclear catastrophes a secret.

Now, after the Soviet collapse,

the Russian government officially recognized their secret cities as legitimate places on the map.

City 40 was able to get legal status in 1994, and was renamed the city of Ozersk,

though still with barbed wire fences and guarded gates.

It's still heavily restricted and extremely secretive,

but if you're somehow able to get in, you'd be treated to picturesque scenery and beautiful lakes.

You'd see mothers pushing newborns in prams,

children playing in the streets,

local women selling fresh fruit and vegetables,

much of it resembling a suburban American town from the 1950s, but if you look closely,

you'd see a different reality.

The Ozersk residents know the truth,

their food is poisoned,

their water is contaminated,

their children are sick,

and much of their picturesque surroundings remain no-go zones.

The seemingly pristine lakes beg for a swim,

but standing even lakeside at Lake Karachay

would give you a sufficiently lethal dose of radiation in only an hour.

Imagine if you were to swim in it.

On average, in Ozersk, you can expect to live to the age of 50,

comparable to the countries with the lowest life expectancy rates.

This all could have been avoided, of course,

if scientists working at Mayak, all those years ago,

had at least the basic understanding of the physics of nuclear energy,

and the processes involved with chain reactions.

Unfortunately, Brilliant didn't exist in 1957,

so they maybe they have an excuse, but fast forward 60 years and you don't,

because it's right here.

Brilliant is a problem-solving website that teaches you to think like a scientist

through interactive quizzes and courses that are designed to be interesting.

You can see there are many courses you can choose from but if you want to be a nuclear physicist,

and I mean a good one, that hopefully won't cause the next Kyshtym disaster,

then Brilliant will help you understand concepts like the difference between the types of nuclear reaction,

how a chain reaction can be used to generate electricity,

and if in fact every chain reaction results in an explosion.

We love explaining about Asia and the world around us,

but the best way to learn is obviously by doing it yourself.

And much like our videos, what Brilliant does is

it takes a problem, breaks them up into bite-sized concepts,

presents clear logic in each part,

and then builds back up to an exciting conclusion.

If you go to brilliant.org/kentobento, you can get started for free,

and if you're one of the first 200 people to sign up with the link below,

you will receive 20% off your premium subscription.

It's an incredibly engaging website, we use it!

And by giving Brilliant a try,

you will also be supporting us here at Kento Bento.